College baseball history was almost made Saturday afternoon as LSU senior pitcher Jared Poche’ was three outs away from a no-hitter as the Tigers struck down Maryland 14-0.
Poche’ continued his dominance to start the game. He allowed one hit and no runs in eight innings pitched.
On the last pitch of the game Poche’ was pleased with the placement but the batter just got a good hit on it.
“I made a good pitch,” Poche’ said. “I got behind in the count and he got enough of it and put it in the right spot. It just wasn’t meant to be I guess.”
Coach Paul Mainieri was going to pull Poche’ in the seventh inning but said pitching coach Alan Dunn talked him out of it.
“I was going to hook him after the seventh inning,” Mainieri said. “I let AD (Dunn) talk me into leaving him in the game there. Poche’ kind of talked me into it too. We were planning on a maximum of 100 pitches and he finished at 98.”
It was a hitting exhibition for the Tigers in the second game as they connected on 18 pitches.
LSU tied a school record of three triples in a game after the third inning.
LSU got off to a fast start in the first inning.
With bases loaded for the Tigers, junior right fielder Greg Deichmann hit a sacrifice fly ball to score Cole Freeman.
With bases loaded later in the inning, freshman first baseman Jake Slaughter singled to left field to bring home Duplantis allowing LSU to take an early 2-0 lead.
Slaughter now has a hit in each of his first seven games as a Tiger. After the game Slaughter discussed just waiting for the right pitch.
“I just try to go out there and every at bat have a quality at bat,” Slaughter said. “I don’t want to miss any pitches that I’m looking for.”
More scoring was in store for the Tigers in the second as Breaux strolled home on an error by Maryland. Another sacrifice fly from Deichmann scored Duplantis as LSU took a commanding 4-0 lead through two.
LSU added seven more runs in the third, another in the fifth, and two more in the eighth to really blow the game open.
Poche’ was replaced in the top of the ninth inning by senior pitcher Russell Reynolds to finish the job.
LSU got a look at some of the backups on the team and Mainieri was impressed with how the bench played overall.
“I thought everybody did well,” Mainieri said. “It was nice to see Beau Jordan get a nice base hit there. It’s hard to really single out anybody I thought the whole team played well tonight.”
